As I've noted in previous posts, I have stepped down from the editorship of the Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry, and this was a step I anticipated even before - one night, way back when, it seems - Scott Thurston and I drew up some initial plans for it. (Read about the last print issue, on Bill Griffiths, here.)
It has now entered the age of Open Access and the first issue is now available (and future issues will be) available here. At the moment it is accreting article by article, review by review. So come back later (or bookmark it) and you will find more when there is more.
Scott Thurston, University of Salford, and Gareth Farmer, University of Bedfordshire, are now the editors for the Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry. Vicky Sparrow, Birkbeck, is the Reviews editor. And I am still one of many on the editorial board.
The journal centres on the poetic writings that have appeared in Britain and Ireland since the late 1950s under various categorizations: for example avant-garde, underground, linguistically innovative, second-wave Modernist, non-mainstream, the British Poetry Revival, the parallel tradition, formally innovative, neo-modernist and experimental, while also including the Cambridge School, the London School, concrete poetry, and performance writing. (I bet there are more!)
It is very exciting to see this developing (and being more openly available), to all, to you, not just to subscribers or libraries, scholars and academics. Even poets might read it now! Decades ago, Sir Karl Popper proposed that all scientific and academic work should be made available to all in just this way. That is now happening - though spare a thought for long-running print journals that will find it difficult to compete (there complex rules about research journals, which I have sat through several presentations about, and not understood a word!).
Read the journal, and return later to re-read later issues. I'll see you there, I hope. Robert
